Next weekend the PACC-contest will be on. This weekend’s European DX contest was a great opportunity to update the computer, contest-software and run some more tests. I got a SPE-amp recently and played with it, hooked it up and configured the software, and unfortunately messed up the COM-port configuration of the N1MM-installation. I only noticed this morning when the contest started.

I use a MicroHAM keyer and obviously I didn’t write down the configuration before testing, so I tried various settings but none worked. This also caused N1MM to crash on the virtual ports created by the MicroHAM drivers. I also have DXLog installed but never used it for a contest. A quick test, and the whole setup worked with DXLog though. What to do next? Well, jump into the deep dark waters and start swimming.

I updated DXLog, loaded the contest-files, configured everything for my station with my contest-call PE6X and went for a bit of S&P. Turns out the main F(unction)-keys are the same as in N1MM. That’s one thing less to learn. I struggled a bit with maintaining the log. Sometimes I made a mistake. E.g. when you hit enter after the exchange is entered, the contact is saved. During one of my first contacts when I was running, the contact wasn’t saved at all. The program kept sending AGN?. So I disabled the PTT of my radio, and hit enter a few times which was followed by AGN? AGN?. No signal is sent with the PTT off, so I could figure out what was wrong. Turned out I entered an incorrect exchange, and this was also said in BIG RED LETTERS below the entry, but since I was still learning the program, I overlooked that. So the AGN made perfect sense, hi. Oh well.

I also changed my antenna a bit to find out if the DX-performance was a bit better. When simulating the antenna, a halfwave has the best take-off angle from my station. Since I use a Chameleon SS25 with the Hybrid Mini, I set it to 1/2 lambda for 10m, which would be 1/4 lambda for 20. All in all less ideal for 15m and way too short for the lower bands, so I didn’t go there. The signals on 10m from Sri Lanka and India came in very loud, and the only Japanese station was better than usual, so I see improvement here. Europe was fine to work on 20m so the take-off angle for that is good at 1/4 lambda

Since I also wanted to test the HC74-contest microphone element of my Heil headset, I ran the contest in Mixed Mode. Seems it worked fine, but even with 100W, it was still a bit difficult to get heard against higher powered stations. Makes sense though. But I think it worked fine.

All in all I worked 150 stations in the category SOALL-LP Mixed. Onwards to the PACC next week. I’m ready for it!